we're selling our house and we're bringing our couch with us too
plus how the muppets taught me how to *tearfully* say goodbye
i’m back with part 2 of your burning moving questions. in part 1, i talked about how we narrowed down our search for the perfect quaint coastal town and why i’ve fallen out of like with los angeles.
a lot of people have asked what the specifics of this giant move are, so read on!
selling our house vs renting…
are you selling your current house or keeping it in case you want to go back?
we have decided to sell our house, while renting it out would be amazing— i also think it would be really stressful. my mom had a house in martha’s vineyard and trying to manage a property from across the country and trust people to be your caretaker was a lot. i don’t want the responsibility of owning the house, i also want the money because we bought it for much less than it’s worth now.
obviously once we sell this house, we won’t be able to afford to buy another one in LA. i mean, that’s the idea!
even if we decided to come back to california, we wouldn’t want to come back to our house or probably not even to LA. but i would probably rather move somewhere else and try a new place if we want to leave CT (probably smartest to actually leave the country at this point!)
what made you decide to sell vs renting a year to see if you like it?
a lot of factors — the wildfires definitely accelerated things for us. in my mind, moving to a new house that we can settle into, and not having to move the kids twice sounds ideal. we’re just embracing a go for broke ‘tude about it!
i also want a house i can fix up (for fun and for my job), and again if we hate it, we sell our next house. life goes on! right??? GULP.
leaving our families
how do you manage guilt about taking grandchildren away from your mom? (my own battle) is your mom coming with you? how does gigi feel about this!?!?
a family friend said last week “don’t live your life with guilt” to which i replied “that is impossible because i was raised by a jewish mother.” but it’s an amazing goal to have! i’m still managing the guilt, and it might get worse when we’re actually there.
as i said, i’ve now spent the last year or so desperately trying to convince to my family to join us!! their current answer is no, but i’m still hopeful once they come to visit maaaybe it could happen.
i’m trying to remind myself constantly that we can’t live our lives for them, as much as i want to. we just have to do what’s best for our family, as sad as that is. MAN do i wish we all just lived somewhere affordable and beautiful and less dangerous, and then this wouldn’t even be an issue!
my mom and stepdad live in an expensive house that’s far too big and has far too many tile steps for our peace of mind. so in my dream scenario— they sell the house, and get a little cute place, and rent a place for half the year near us! they could be there may-october and live somewhere warm for the winters!
it could be just like the gilmore girls mom, i promise we can walk around the town green singing LA LA LAA LA LAAAA LA LA LAAAA
anyone that knows me probably knows i’m really bad at goodbyes. even just like going home after a party my family says goodbye for very prolonged periods of time. it has always annoyed all of our spouses. i even cried on our honeymoon when saying goodbye to our new honeymoon friends!
i’m not quite sure how i’ll manage this massive a goodbye to be honest! no one has ever expressed it quite as poignantly as the musical stylings of the muppets…
saying goodbye
why is it sad?
makes us remember the good times we've had
much more to say
foolish to try
it's time for saying goodbye
don't want to leave
but we both know
sometimes it's better to go
somehow i know we'll meet again
not sure quite where
and i don't know just when
you're in my heart
so until then
wanna smile
wanna cry
saying goodbye
if you aren’t familiar with this song, try not to cry!!! i dare you! (unless this is a total nostalgia-exclusive thing because just pasting those lyrics made me teary eyed)
how far from poppy will you be? has anyone checked on poppy? will poppy move too since he’s already in boston?
you may have noticed poppy hasn’t been visiting as much these days, honestly he’s aged a lot recently :( and traveling is getting harder for him. but he is STOKED we’ll be so close (we’ll be a two hour drive).
i mentioned already that as much as i love massachussetts, we can afford a lot more in CT, so he understands that but has no plans to move (can you imagine him trying to pack up that house?! i’m assuming it’ll just be my problem someday)
househunting (!!) & logistics of a cross country move
what qualities are you looking for in a new house?
any musts for the new house? i feel like you need a wood burning fireplace.
i agree about the fireplace! but i’d be happier with a gas fireplace because gid hates campfire smell and weird al’s parents died from forgetting to open their flue 💔 but you can get carbon monoxide poisoning from gas fireplaces too probably??
we want something that feels private, the idea of not looking outside and seeing neighbors houses is A DREAM!
i decided i’ll devote an entire newsletter to my dream house in detail - would that be fun to read!? still workshopping here!
will gid have to find a new job or can he work from home?
well so, gid got laid off from his job again this year, i didn’t announce it to you guys because how many times can one guy get laid off from a job?! lol. the industry he is in totally sucks, just like most industries right now — and he’s sort of starting to explore some different avenues now.
even if he ends up in the same type of job though, he’s worked remotely for years so we’re hoping that could stay the case!
we’ve also daydreamed about opening up our own business together there! but also sounds like a lot more work than i like haha.
do you bring everything or buy new?
we’re planning on bringing a lot! as i design the new rooms we’ll probably switch a lot of it up, but i don’t want to put that pressure on myself right away so we’ll bring our furniture, so we have furniture.
it’s been so long since we’ve moved but that’s always part of the fun! seeing how your old stuff fits in your new place!
but yes, a cross country move with all our furniture is gonna be quite $$$! we’re starting to talk about driving cross country so we don’t have to ship our car (plus it might be REALLY FUN AND MAGICAL but also very very hard but worth it for the memories?!?!)
leaving LA
what will you miss most about LA?
our people and our food!!!! i will miss so many restaurants, but our beloved katsuya is especially ingrained in our hearts.
the road trips — the proximity to palm springs, santa barbara, san diego, etc. but i know there are tons of amazing weekend trips we can take in new england too.
halloween — our area is overrun with production designers that go ALL out on their houses and it’s a highlight of october for us, but again we’re trading it for idyllic autumnal halloween vibes?
disneyland — even though i’ve really become down on it haha. the prices are just obscene and i even read now they’re cutting down trees so people won’t have shade to stop in!!!
do you have a last months in LA bucket list that you are trying to check off?
we will! right now we’ve been SO focused on purging, packing, decluttering for listing, that it’s hard to focus on the reality of leaving right now and making it fun whatsoever.
one final disneyland trip
little tokyo
the griffith observatory (arlo has never been and it was my #1 favorite place to skip school and go to as a burnout teenager!!!)
a tour of our favorite foods — hiho, kazu nori hand rolls, larchmont wine and cheese salami sandwiches, all time, miz la la, bestia and bavel, we’ve had lots of special celebratory dinners at angelini osteria and osteria mozza and cliff’s edge (now bacari but still has my heart). the pasta at la pergoletta! the croissants at figaro bistrot, where my mom and i have been eating for 25 years now 😭
we’ve literally never taken arlo to do most of the touristy things around town because everything is so crowded and terrible now, but now i feel like we gotta take him to the wax museum before its too late too! haha
how are you planning to deal with the transition of it all for arlo?
we asked chat gpt the other day and it was shockingly helpful, we’re going to use like all of the advice it gave us??? i’ll keep you in the loop with the process, but we’re going to make him two books.
the first will be an LA memory book, we’ll collect photos and messages from his favorite people, souvenirs, his favorite places.
the second will be a CT book, we’ll start it as a treasure map to collect memories from his first time seeing the beach or first ice cream, etc. thinking about gifting it to him along with a camera like this so he can print his photographs. as we make new memories, we can add to the book and really emphasis the whole fun adventure part of it.
do we like this idea?! does it sound like it could help!?
quite frankly it might be really cathartic for the two of us to do together!
visiting questions
curious, when is the best time to visit new england? i’d love to check it out!
spring/fall! summer is obviously amazing too, but i love the spring when things are starting to bloom and there aren’t people everywhere, and obviously there is nothing like new england fall foliage!
heading to cape cod later this fall, any suggestions?
sadly nope! my grandparents had a boat there and we spent time there as little kids but once we started going to martha’s vineyard we’ve spent zero time on the cape.
but i would love to start going because the vineyard has changed so much, it’s all so expensive and fancy and it would be so nice to not have to take a ferry. so i’ll report back on that— but for now, my one recommendation is sal’s place in provicetown! (we’re obsessed with their annual LA winter pop up here)
however if you’re going to the vineyard i’ve got you covered!
and the biggest, most intense question of all…
why such a big life change?
RIGHT? this is nuts. but i’m really excited for this adventure.
this sweet little message really got me.
SO GREAT !! I AM FRIENDS WITH YOUR MOM AND WE USED TO LIVE NEXT TO EACH OTHER (A FEW YEARS APART) WE MOVED TO MONTANA SEVERAL YEARS AGO WITH OUR BOYS...THE BEST DECISION WE EVER MADE !!
YOU WILL LOVE YOUR NEW ADVENTURE !!
I am so proud of you Molly.